Year in Review: Republican candidates win the SCV in 2012

The election of two local Democrats to represent the area on Nov. 6 led some to speculate the Santa Clarita Valley was perhaps becoming more of a two-party, “purple” area.

But figures from the Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk’s office show those gains were more in spite of local voters, not because of them.

In returns from the city of Santa Clarita, not a single Democratic candidate received more votes than their Republican counterpart.

The smallest margin in those races was in the state’s 27th Senate District, where Republican Todd Zink outpolled eventual winner state Sen. Fran Pavley, D-Agoura Hills, by 1,998 votes out of almost 13,000 cast.

The next closest race was for Los Angeles County district attorney, where Alan Jackson led eventual winner Jackie Lacey by 6,134 votes out of more than 62,000 cast in Santa Clarita.

Local Republicans actually fared better than their state or national counterparts in Santa Clarita. 38th District Assemblyman Scott Wilk, R-Santa Clarita, U.S. Rep. Howard “Buck” McKeon, R-Santa Clarita, and 21st District Sen. Steve Knight, R-Palmdale, all recorded larger margins of victory than Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney and Elizabeth Emken, the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate.

Romney and Emken both went on to lose their election races.

The mostly red picture is much the same in the unincorporated areas of the Santa Clarita Valley.

No Democratic representative candidate received more votes than a Republican opponent in the unincorporated areas of Acton, Agua Dulce, Castaic, Saugus, Stevenson Ranch or Valencia.

One exception to this trend is unincorporated Canyon Country, where Democratic candidates received more votes than Republican opponents in all but two races — the 36th Assembly District race between Republican Ron Smith and eventual winner Steve Fox, D-Palmdale, and the 28th U.S. Congressional District race between Democrat Rep. Adam Schiff and Republican Phil Jennerjahn.

Only 23 ballots were cast in the race between Schiff and Jennerjahn.

Unincorporated Newhall also saw a slight Democratic lean, albeit out of only 118 ballots cast.

The Santa Clarita Valley also voted decisively against Proposition 30, Gov. Jerry Brown’s tax-hike proposal. The city of Santa Clarita voted against the measure by almost 14,000 votes out of more than 70,000 ballots cast.

There was no disagreement on the matter from unincorporated areas of the valley — every single one had more votes against Proposition 30 than for it.

Rejected by a margin of just north of 500,000 votes, Proposition 34, which would have eliminated the state’s death penalty, was decided by the narrowest margin of any state ballot proposition.

But Santa Clarita Valley voters were not so divided. Like with Proposition 30, neither the city nor any unincorporated areas of the valley cast more votes in favor of Proposition 34 than against it.

While Santa Clarita Valley voters followed the statewide trend with Proposition 34, they broke with the state for several other ballot measures including Measure B, which requires condoms be worn during filming of pornographic material.

Every portion of the valley but the unincorporated areas of Canyon Country and Valencia voted against Measure B, which passed by almost 400,000 votes statewide.

Local voters also narrowly voted for Proposition 32, which would have limited corporate and union donations to political entities.

Proposition 32 was defeated by about 1.3 million votes statewide but voters in the city of Santa Clarita and the unincorporated areas of Acton, Agua Dulce, Stevenson Ranch and Valencia cast more votes in favor of it.